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Toronto: Restaurants, Stores, Trips [recommendations]

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For five years now, I’ve spent 3 to 4 months of my year in Toronto (late winter / spring, mostly), and I just returned from another 3-month stay. Now Alex – a German friend of mine – and her partner are in town, and she’s asked me for recommendations: food, activities, stores, trips etc..

I’m not a very activity-minded person and spend most of my Toronto time in libraries, bookstores and cafés. I’m sure there’s lots of cool stuff that I’ve missed or dismissed. For what it’s worth: Here are my recommendations.

I like Tim Hortons donuts and danishes: their Maple Dip donut, their Canadian Maple dount, the Sour-Cream Glazed donut and the Maple Pecan danish are all pretty good. At Second Cup, I often get a Strawberry Lemonade Fruit Chiller.

Mondays to Fridays, between ca. 5.30 pm and 6.30 pm, you can get two boxes of (good) sushi for about 7 dollars at Sushi on the Run at College Park / Yonge and College.

There’s a bunch of good Portugese bakeries at Bloor and Ossington, a bunch of good (if fatty / unhealthy) Chinese bakeries in Chinatown and a famous and well-beloved (expensive!) chocolate maker, SOMA, at the Distillery District. […don’t go to the Distillery District as a sight-seeing trip, though: It’s just a couple of cobblestone streets that will not surprise / amaze a girl from rural Germany].

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General stuff:

Get a Metropass to use Toronto’s subway, streetcars and busses. A day pass costs $ 10. A weekly pass around 40. A single, one-way trip less than $ 3.

Groceries – especially cheese and dairy products – are pretty expensive. But eating out is relatively cheap: For $ 15 to $ 25, you will get a good meal. Most days, I spend about $ 25 (EUR 18) on dinner, coffee and snacks.

Every Wednesday night, the AGO – Art Gallery of Ontario is free to the public. I like them a lot. There’s also the ROM Museum… but overall, they favor nature over culture, and I’m not very interested in animals and natural history.

Theatre is pretty expensive. Still: Get a free NOW magazine or look at the events listings of The Grid to find shows, performances, gallery events etc..

Concerts, on the other hand, are surprisingly cheap. I use last.fm to find out when bands I like come to Toronto, and I often see smaller, more inimate sets of less-known songwriters at the Drake Hotel Underground stage.

There’s a (free) drag show at Woody’s nearly every night, starting at about 10. There’s also Crews and Tangos, a younger, alternative place that reminded me of lots of horrible, sweaty parties in university. Alex? You will like this a lot. Check out the listings at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, too.

There are lots of small galleries on Queen Street West, west of Bathurst. Spend a morning / day strolling around there. I like hipster shops / art spaces like Magic Pony, too.

Kensington Market is charming and hippie-ish, and lots of friends I took there enjoyed the place much more than me. Same goes for the boutiques and jewellery stores on Queen Street West. One German friend loved the greenhouses at Allan Gardens – they are free and a fun way to spend half an hour.

I love going to the Islands: Take a cheap ferry (to Ward’s Island or Centre Island) and walk all the way to Hanlan’s Point. Highly, highly recommended!

Don’t get tickets for the CN tower. It’s nearly $ 30, and not worth it. A day trip to Niagara Falls was pretty depressing / disappointing, too, and I would not go there again. [That being said… if you DO go, read this wonderful, depressing book by Stewart O’Nan, about depressed people at depressing Niagara Falls!]